Malaysian GP: Kawasaki Racing Saturday notes

DE PUNIET AND WEST ON THE SECOND ROW AT SEPANG
Today's qualifying practice at Sepang ended with Kawasaki's Randy de
Puniet heading up the second row with his team mate, Anthony West right
behind him on the grid for tomorrow's Malaysian Grand ...

DE PUNIET AND WEST ON THE SECOND ROW AT SEPANG

Today's qualifying practice at Sepang ended with Kawasaki's Randy de
Puniet heading up the second row with his team mate, Anthony West right
behind him on the grid for tomorrow's Malaysian Grand Prix.

In the afternoon's nail-biting session, the Frenchman crashed out, rode
his spare bike for much of the allocated hour, then rode home his
hastily-repaired, primary Ninja ZX-RR to fourth place on the leader board
in the very final moments. He clocked his best qualifying time of
2'02.107 with a top speed of 296.5kmh, just behind Marco Melandri who
snatched the last place on the front row in the closing seconds by the
tiniest margin of 0.163 seconds.

De Puniet began the day with another scorching free practice, which saw
him coming second on the results sheets with a time of 2'02.534, just
0.243 behind Casey Stoner. Having notched up such consistently good lap
times on race tyres throughout all sessions, de Puniet feels confident
for tomorrow's 21-lap race.

It was an electrifying session, which resulted in West's best qualifying
position yet in MotoGP. The 26-year-old Australian enjoyed provisional
pole after putting in his best lap time of 2'02.202 on his first
qualifying tyre. This was eventually stolen from him but he maintained a
front row spot until the very last second, when Melandri and de Puniet
pushed him back to fifth in an exciting climax.

But West is positive: he, like his team mate, has been having an
excellent weekend at Sepang so far. The final practice combined times
clocked him as fifth fastest in the field of riders and a long run on
race tyres saw him show remarkable consistency, culminating in a best
time of 2'02.627.

Watching tomorrow's race will be the President of Kawasaki Heavy
Industries Ltd, Mr Tadaharu Ohashi, who is currently visiting Malaysia on
business, and the President of Kawasaki's Consumer Products and Machinery
Company, Mr Shinichi Tamba. De Puniet and West will be particularly keen
to do well in front of the two men who have done so much in support of
Kawasaki's MotoGP project this year.

Randy de Puniet #14 - 4th - Best Lap 2'02.107

"As in the past couple of races, I'd hoped for a better position but I
had a small crash early in the session and had to use my second bike for
quite a while after that. I had a good feeling from it, although I prefer
my other bike. I used two different types of qualifying tyre and one of
them didn't work for me at all: it was impossible to finish a lap. The
other one was better and I used that on my normal bike at the end, which
got me this good lap time. It was so close and I'm just two tenths of a
second off pole. We have a good base for tomorrow with the bike, and
we've gone very fast on race tyres all weekend, so we should be able to
do well."

Anthony West #13 - 5th - Best Lap 2'02.202

"It was good to be up the front for most of the qualifying session and I
was feeling really comfortable. We used two different types of qualifiers
and the two I didn't do so well on are the ones which are usually the
best at other circuits. Here, it was the opposite way around. The first
one I used was really good but the others barely lasted a lap. I'm
actually quite disappointed I didn't stay on the front row but the main
thing is I know that with this set up, our race Bridgestones and the good
feeling I've got, it's not as if I've only been on the pace for the one
lap. So I'm pretty confident and we'll see how it goes tomorrow.
Everything's working really well this weekend; it's nice."

Fanali - West's Crew Chief

"Anthony's never ridden on this racetrack on a MotoGP bike so, for him,
it's been completely new and, from the first practice session, we've been
improving. This morning he did many laps on a race tyre and was still
getting better and better times. He was in the top five so he's riding
very well, the bike's working brilliantly, and so are the tyres, so I
feel he can be strong tomorrow. He's always at his best in the race too
so, as he's starting from a good position, I'm sure he can fight for a
top finish."